High-tech, old ethics

In the matter of a few days, the Kenyan election crisis spawned some 600 new websites. Bloggers discussed the perceived procedural flaws in late December as well as the violence that followed. Charles Onyango-Obbo, managing editor for new media and convergence at the Nairobi-based Nation Media Group, admits that the mainstream media probably looked rather pro-establishment in comparison. He says the impact of the web was relevant, even though, in Africa on average, only five percent of the people have access to the internet, and most election-related blogs were produced in English.

Web-activism, however, took various forms. While some authors assessed legal issues and demanded democracy, others articulated hatred and called for violence. Militant outfits used websites to coordinate their hooligans. Their death threats intimidated journalists. In recent months, On­y­ango-Obbo reports, it was non-state actors rather than government agencies that curtailed the freedom of the media in Kenya. Whether the militants had links to political parties or authorities, was hard to tell.

According to Onyango-Obbo, contributors to the new websites often reside abroad. Kenya’s diaspora found a way to get involved in the unfolding crisis. Indeed, many were probably encouraged by the relative safety of their abode, far away from the turmoil. Onyango-Obbo notes that web-users fast developed a sense of loyalty to certain sites, and that, given the blatant democracy deficit, many authors predominantly wanted to vent their anger. In any case, web-based communication was suddenly of unusual importance in Kenya. “We had not expected that,” says Onyango-Obbo.
Faster old media

Indeed, most media professionals in developing countries do not consider websites competition to what they do. Rather, the internet has made it easier to produce conventional newspapers and broadcast programmes. Vidya Subrahmaniam is the deputy-editor-in-chief of The Hindu, an English-language quality daily in India. She recalls with horror that, only 25 years ago as a correspondent for the paper, she had to communicate with her headoffice over unreliable telephone and telegraph services. Often, she says, only distorted messages got through, and it was normally impossible to update a story while events unfolded. In the 1990s, the fax machine was considered a great step forward, but compared with e-mail, that form of communication was still clumsy.

While the traditional press is in crisis in many rich countries, the industry is booming in India as well as in many parts of Africa and other developing regions of the world. Literacy has been spreading, and many countries have introduced democracy. There now is more scope for wide-ranging public discourse.

On the other hand, Subrahmaniam bemoans that growth in circulation and sales has not necessarily gone along with growth in terms of quality. Spurred on by a barely regulated broadcast media, which “only knows the mantra of ‘hook the audience’,” some Indian papers are becoming more sensationalist. They tend to dedicate more and more space to film and sports stars, rather than publish serious coverage of complex social and political developments. Sankashar Thakur of the Kolkata-based daily The Telegraph agrees. He says that in some ways, Indian media are suffering from “too much” freedom. In his view, it is too easy for publishers to make profits in India today. If what matters to the publishing company is sales, and sales can be generated with trivia, then the traditional ethics and standards of journalism are at risk. If the media only focus on what is going on with the glamorous five percent of a country’s population, without paying attention to the bottom 80 %, Thakur warns, the social fabric and even democracy itself may be at risk.

Professionally trained journalists know that their writing should reflect the views of various parties involved in any issue, and they have been taught to diligently quote or at least indicate their sources. All this is essential, for otherwise the public cannot judge a journalist’s work. However, such practice is not typical of tabloid sensationalism or bloggers who vent emotions.

Standards at risk

While Indian journalists feel that their professional traditions are being undermined by low-quality minded media houses, journalists in rich nations feel threatened by a similar trend. Many publishing companies are cutting staff and reducing expenditure on research, trying to attract their audience with fast-produced content. To an increasing extent, after all, people are reading their news on the web, and they are not prepared to pay for the information they want. Bertrand Pecquerie of the World Editors Forum therefore speaks of a “new business model”. In this context, Kean Wong, a Berlin-based Malaysian journalist, considers it the most important challenge today to maintain and protect the culture of professional journalism in an increasingly commercialised environment.

Professional journalists accurately report facts and transparently inform the public of who said and did what. Such coverage is indispensable for democratic, inclusive societies. Former World Bank President James Wolfensohn once even spoke of press freedom as being at the heart of equitable development. Quality journalism is not only vital for democracy, but also for economic success. After all, investors need reliable information, as Eduard Westreicher of the German Development Ministry said at a conference that was co-hosted by InWEnt’s International Institute of Journalism (IIJ) and Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (F.A.Z.), Germany’s leading conservative daily, in Berlin in March.

At the same event, Werner D’Inka of F.A.Z.’s board of editors expressed optimism. In his view, the standards of quality journalism will prevail. For good reporting, according to him, “we must check and double check our sources, and that is nothing new.” Media outlets that do not do so, are likely to lose their credibility. People do not want to “fly home with a citizen pilot” but will always prefer a professional one, goes his argument, and that should be similar in the case of journalism. Hugh Williamson, Berlin correspondent of The Financial Times, nonetheless pointed to websites exacerbating researchers’ time pressure.

Astrid Kohl, head of the IIJ, says there are many ways to promote press freedom. The approach of InWEnt is to train journalistic skills and help colleagues to network across borders in order to sustain ethics.
Across borders

It is well known that up-to-date communication technology allows dissidents to get information out of a country under authoritarian rule. Pictures of Buddhist monks transmitted by mobile phone last fall come to mind, or reports retrieved from Iranian blogs. But to what extent the web also helps to get controversial information back into such countries is a different matter.

In the early days of the internet, censorship seemed unthinkable. That has changed, as government authorities have refined their technologies. Alan Robles, a journalist and web-host based in Manila mentions the “great fire wall of China” in this context. However, there are ways to get around the censors, for instance, by using proxy-servers or code-words for certain topics that an authoritarian regime considers taboo. Experts admit, however, that something that worked well yesterday may no longer do so tomorrow, as the authorities are always trying to catch up with dissidents.

Controling of the web is difficult in technical terms. Moreover, some authoritarian governments shy from doing so for political reasons. They do not want to tarnish their international reputation, and limiting web-freedom is a way of achieving exactly that. However, undemocratic governments punish online-authors in draconian ways if they get hold of them. That brutal deterrent keeps people from expressing their views. According to Reporters without Borders, an international organisation, one third of the world’s imprisoned authors today published their controversial words on the web.

Most web-traffic across borders, however, is not about dissent. It is about migrants staying in touch with relatives in their home countries. Robles points to the fact that Filipinos generate something like 1 billion text messages per day. The diaspora, however, never became a unified political force, he says, and does not have an impact on domestic affairs.

In the event of crisis, however, that may change fast. At least that is what happened in Kenya, without the diaspora having become a joint force.